Over 30 years working in the vehicle aftermarket and more than 12,000 visits to vehicle repairers, the sentiment has always been the same: repairers would prefer to buy and fit genuine as long as price and service are competitive. From one-man bands to fully compliant bodyshops and branches of national chains, owners and technicians would all prefer to fit genuine.

Why don’t they?
Vehicle manufacturers can be competitive at trade price level, without compromising normal dealer net and retail profit margins. We’ve proved this time and time again for every manufacturer we’ve worked with. So, over this series of posts, we’ll be looking at all aspects of service which influence the choice of parts supplier.

Defining the trade
In very simple terms, we define a trade customer as an individual or company that buys and fits parts for profit, plus businesses with their own workshops that repair their own vehicles. Over coming posts we’ll break this down into each repairer type and look at the service nuances that determine their parts suppliers.

THINK ABOUT… Don’t underestimate the one-man band. They may not spend £000’s every month but there are lots of them and they tend to be more loyal to local dealers if someone makes the effort to talk to them.

Relationships
The most undervalued aspect of service. When everything else is equal, a prospect will buy from the individual they like the most. They may even tolerate a slightly higher price or slightly slower delivery. Over future posts we’ll work through the fundamentals of relationship building and how they are important for every member of the parts team.

THINK ABOUT… Your parts people may know part numbers off the top of their heads but if they can’t develop a conversation, you’ll only ever be a supplier of last resort.

Call handling
In a typical factor, branch sales advisors are expected to take or make a minimum combined total of 200 sales calls per day. The ratio of inbound to outbound will vary through the month, by day of the week and how close it is until pay day. We’ll take a look at phone office resourcing and flexibility, inbound/outbound techniques and conversation strategies.

THINK ABOUT… What call statistics do you currently have access to?

Delivery
Within every delivery area will be at least three national chain factor branches and a couple of local independents. We’ll look at delivery area planning and prioritisation to help you get the most from limited van resources.

THINK ABOUT… Who contributes to delivery resources: dealer … vehicle manufacturer … parts manufacturers?

Parts Sales Representatives
A controversial subject, with many factor chains losing traditional branch-based reps or spreading them thinly over a number of branches to the point of ineffectiveness. We’ll give guidance as to where, when, and how a parts sales rep can make an acceptable ROI.

THINK ABOUT… How do you view a parts rep: sales manager or van sales?

Administration
Setting the right payment terms, picking up credits and processing paperwork all rank highly on the wants and needs of independent garages. We’ll take a close look at this often-overlooked aspect of customer service to make sure that you’re easy to do business with.

THINK ABOUT… Can your customers easily understand your statements? Really?

Accuracy
The competition has improved immensely over the last decade in terms of supplying the right part against a given VRM or VIN, but their systems still regularly throw-up ambiguous notes or choices. We’ll show you how to exploit factor inaccuracy and how to analyse parts returns effectively.

THINK ABOUT… Can you tell if parts were sent out incorrectly or if they were ordered incorrectly in the first place?

Warranty
In theory the typical trade warranty process described by vehicle manufacturer trade programmes should be unbeatable. In practice most trade customers hate it. It’s an easy fix and we’ll look at how.

THINK ABOUT… Do you know how dealers are applying your warranty terms for the trade?

Retail Pricing
With many factor chains running constant ‘online sales’ to retail customers it’s common for car owners to be able to buy cheaper than repairers. We’ll show how to exploit this ‘pet hate’ of the trade and why consistent retail pricing is important.

THINK ABOUT… Are your retail to trade margins discount driven or part number specific?